Biden: Lawmakers’ Iran letter ‘beneath dignity’ of Senate

WASHINGTON – US Vice President Joe Biden lashed out at Republican lawmakers for their “highly misleading” letter Monday to Iran’s leaders cautioning against a nuclear deal with the United States, a letter he described as “false as it is dangerous.”

“The letter sent on March 9th by 47 Republican Senators to the Islamic Republic of Iran, expressly designed to undercut a sitting president in the midst of sensitive international negotiations, is beneath the dignity of an institution I revere,” Biden said in a statement.

Forty-seven Republicans, including Senate leaders and several potential 2016 presidential candidates, wrote an open letter to Iran’s leader, warning any deal with Obama might not be honored in future. In the letter, Republicans said that without congressional approval, any deal between Iran and the US would be merely an agreement between Obama and Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

The letter, wrote Biden, “ignores two centuries of precedent and threatens to undermine the ability of any future American President, whether Democrat or Republican, to negotiate with other nations on behalf of the United States.”

Biden went on to warn that the letter and its implications undercut America’s interests by “sends a highly misleading signal to friend and foe alike that that our Commander-in-Chief cannot deliver on America’s commitments.”

“The decision to undercut our president and circumvent our constitutional system offends me as a matter of principle,” Biden wrote.

Repeating administration critiques of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s speech before Congress last Tuesday, Biden complained that “as a matter of policy, the letter and its authors have also offered no viable alternative to the diplomatic resolution with Iran that their letter seeks to undermine.”

Earlier, US President Barack Obama said the letter is ironic because, in his words, some members of Congress appear to want to align themselves with “hardliners” in Iran.

The president termed this “an unusual coalition.”

The White House responded angrily, accusing the senators of interference and continuing a “partisan strategy to undermine the president’s ability to conduct foreign policy and advance our national security.

“It raises significant questions about the intent or the aims of the authors,” said spokesman Josh Earnest, who accused the senators of establishing a “back channel” with hardliners in Tehran.

With a March deadline looming, negotiators are furiously working to agree to a deal that would curb Iran’s nuclear program in return for reducing Western sanctions.

The deal is seen as a key foreign-policy goal of the Obama administration.

Earnest also accused Republicans of supporting airstrikes against Iran’s facilities that the White House says would only temporarily set back Iran’s program.

“The rush to war, or at least the rush to the military option that many Republicans are advocating, is not at all in the best interests of the United States,” added Earnest.

Greg Rosenbaum, chair of the board of directors of the National Jewish Democratic Council, accused the Republican senators, led by Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AR), of “endanger[ing] Israel’s security and play[ing] partisan politics with the US-Israel relationship.”

“While preventing Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon is of the utmost importance to both the United States and Israel, it is vital that negotiators be given the space and time they need to properly find a peaceful solution,” Rosenbaum wrote in a statement Monday afternoon.